Projects per year
Abstract
Typological data shows a tendency for languages to exhibit harmonic (i.e. consistent) ordering between heads and dependents. However, some categories seem to contradict this tendency. Here we investigate one such case, the order of the noun with respect to two dependents—adjectives, which tend to follow the noun and genitives which precede. We report two silent gesture experiments examining (i) whether there are cognitive biases favouring postnominal adjective and prenominal genitive order in a single trial judgement task, and (ii) if those preferences continue to influence order when participants learn a complete word order system. Our results shed light on how biases for individual categories of elements interact with biases that affect the wider linguistic system. While participants strongly prefer postnominal adjectives and prenominal genitives when these are judged in isolation, when they learn a system of ordering, these biases are obscured and (at least in some cases) harmony emerges.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Proceedings of the 44th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society |
Editors | Jennifer Culbertson, Andrew Perfors, Hugh Rabagliati, Veronica Ramenzoni |
Publisher | eScholarship University of California |
Pages | 1011-1018 |
Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 17 Jun 2022 |
Event | 44th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society - Toronto, Canada Duration: 27 Jul 2022 → 30 Jul 2022 Conference number: 44 https://cognitivesciencesociety.org/cogsci-2022/ |
Publication series
Name | Proceedings of the Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society |
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Publisher | Cognitive Science Society |
Volume | 44 |
ISSN (Electronic) | 1069-7977 |
Conference
Conference | 44th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society |
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Abbreviated title | CogSci 2022 |
Country/Territory | Canada |
City | Toronto |
Period | 27/07/22 → 30/07/22 |
Internet address |
Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)
- cognitive bias
- silent gesture
- harmony
- word order
- learning
Fingerprint
Dive into the research topics of 'The influence of category-specific and system-wide preferences on cross-linguistic word order patterns'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.Projects
- 1 Finished
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Syntax shaped by cognition: transforming theories of syntactic systems through laboratory experiments
Culbertson, J. (Principal Investigator)
1/02/18 → 31/01/24
Project: Research
Research output
- 1 Book
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Proceedings of the 44th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society
Culbertson, J. (Editor), Perfors, A. (Editor), Rabagliati, H. (Editor) & Ramenzoni, V. (Editor), Jul 2022, (E-pub ahead of print) eScholarship University of California. (Proceedings of the Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society; vol. 44)Research output: Book/Report › Book
Open Access